Foundation That Supports Abolishing Police Lists Stacey Abrams As Governor, Board Member: Report

Democratic Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams is listed as a board member and governor of a foundation that supports defunding the police.

Fox News reported that state filings show Abrams serves in those positions at the Seattle-based Marguerite Casey Foundation.

On March 10, the foundation tweeted a story from The Washington Post showing the outlet “collected data on nearly 40,000 payments at 25 of the nation’s largest police and sheriff’s departments within the past decade, documenting more than $3.2 billion spent to settle claims [of wrongdoing].”

The foundation added, “[Defund the Police].”

https://twitter.com/CaseyGrants/status/1502072307384266753

Earlier in March, the foundation tweeted, “Grant recipient [Dream Defenders] + Partners launched the Doctors Within Borders Urgent Care Clinic as part of a larger movement to create direct services and sites of intervention in police violence and prison systems.”

It continued, “[Defund the Police].”

https://twitter.com/CaseyGrants/status/1499473714924048387

Additionally, earlier this year, the foundation shared a story titled, “Cop City and the Prison Industrial Complex in Atlanta.”

The foundation then tweeted, “[Abolish the Police].”

https://twitter.com/CaseyGrants/status/1492170312984707075

According to the foundation’s website, it was founded in 2001 as a “pri­vate, inde­pen­dent grant-mak­ing foun­da­tion ded­i­cat­ed to help­ing low-income fam­i­lies strength­en their voice and mobi­lize their com­mu­ni­ties.”

It “works to change and inform the advance­ment of social and eco­nom­ic poli­cies and prac­tices that pro­mote the devel­op­ment of strong fam­i­lies and strong com­mu­ni­ties; encour­age the devel­op­ment of a coher­ent knowl­edge base for advo­cates, fam­i­lies and the orga­ni­za­tions that serve them; and invest in sys­tem change and cross-sys­tem change to gen­er­ate greater knowl­edge and pro­vide effec­tive work­ing mod­els for practice.”

During an interview with ABC News in June 2020, Abrams commented on the debate surrounding the idea of defunding the police.

“We have to have a transformation of how we view the role of law enforcement, how we view the construct of public safety, and how we invest not only in the work that we need them to do to protect us but the work that we need to do to protect and build our communities,” Abrams said.

She added, “And that’s the conversation we’re having: We’ll use different language to describe it, but fundamentally we must have reformation and transformation.”

Abrams suggested the defunding the police debate has created a “false choice idea.”